Story of a Soldier
by AriasSeth56
Summary: The sole survivor of a military disaster, Captain Aren Daniels is recruited for one more mission by the U.S. military. His mission, stop a power hungry mercenary from traveling to another world. But Daniels and Kilo Team fail, now they have to travel to this new world to stop Bjorn Ironside from taking over it. Rated M for strong language, strong violence and sexual content


Story of a Soldier

By Arias Seth

Chapter One

One Last Mission

1000 hours, July 2nd, 2068

It has been six months since Operation Rainforest in Brazil, yet the memories haven't left. Every night I am haunted by the gunfire and screams, never ceasing in their torment of me.

I was the only survivor of my detachment of four thousand Marines that had been sent into the rainforest, as the brunt of a joint operation with Britain and Germany. The press labeled me a hero and made up stories about my "bravery" in the jungle, and people would walk by me and praise me for my heroics but knew exactly what I was. I was a lucky bastard that was it, nothing more. I sighed and took another swig from my flask of Jack Daniels, then looked down at my left hand and the object that I was holding in it. It was the luck charm my daughter had given me the day before I left to Brazil. It was pretty much one of those blind bag figures of a cartoon show character from back in the early parts of this century on a string, well you couldn't expect a seven year old to know how to make an artistic creation now could you. I don't know what the name of it was exactly but it did get me out of that hellhole that I had been in, even though CPS took my daughter from me the moment I got back, saying something about me being too mentally unstable for her to be around.

"Fuck them! Fuck them and those motherfucking Feds." I growled and slammed my flask on the table. Ever since I had gotten back I had been trying to get out of the Marine Corps but the damn Feds wouldn't let me. Every time I sent in my resignation they would always give me some bullshit excuse to get me to stay. And you know the worst part? I bought them. I bought every one of those piece of shit excuses they gave me. All I wanted was to get out and find some way to forget what happened in the rainforest. To forget what happened to my men.

Hell, I could still here the sound of the bullets ripping through their flesh. Of the explosions tearing them to pieces. And most of all I could still see their names and faces. Jenkins with his sly smile and cocky eyes. Danners with his buckteeth and annoying habit of chewing tobacco. Mobutu and his incessant complaining about health code violations. Stellan with his cigars and stern face, and Sato with his katana on his back even though he never had an opportunity to use it. All of them and the rest, I could still see. I could still see them as they died, and I wasn't able to do anything to save them.

_How did my father manage while he was in the Rangers? _I asked myself. He had been the sole survivor of his squad twice, each time he would keep kicking ass and come back home, then rest, then get a new squad and go right back out there. I respected my father in that aspect, and also for the fact that when I or my mother needed him, he would be there, even though he was a Special Forces soldier and a doctor. He studied the Ebola virus and was actually working with nano-technology to figure out a cure for it. He used that very same tech to cure all forms of cancer and most STDs, but for some reason, which he never explained to us, it never worked in curing a patient of Ebola.

_I wish that he was here with me. _I thought to myself, but my father could not be here as he didn't exist anymore. He died on a Russian aircraft carrier that had been hijacked by German terrorists and that had been carrying a weaponized version of the Zaire strain of the Ebola virus. Well technically speaking he didn't die on it, he blew it up while he was on the aircraft carrier. His team had gotten out of there but he stayed behind because the explosives' timers had failed so someone needed to stay behind.

You might be able to say that my family is one of high prestige, but in reality my father and I are the only ones in our family who have taken combat roles in the military and have served in multiple operations. My father only served in one actual war, while I have served in three.

Throughout my entire military career I had been the brightest of all the Marines who graduated OCS with me. Most officers thought that I could be a general by now but that wasn't for me. I was a line officer, I fought next to my men, I didn't send them to their deaths while I would sit in air conditioning and smoke cigars.

I would smoke the cigars with my men in whatever climate we were in. There were times when we would be in arctic terrain one day and desert terrain the next. The men and women of the 1st Marine Division had seen some the most challenging of operations compared to the rest of the U.S. Military since I had joined.

"Well, that's enough reminiscing for you Ary." I said aloud to myself, "Time to get your ass cleaned up so you can go out into public for groceries." I added as I got up and headed to the shower.

About six minutes later I stepped out of the shower and dried myself off, then brushed my teeth and then I put on my clothes and walked out of my bedroom and as I went to go grab my keys, my phone rang, and before I even pulled it out of my pocket. Only one man would ever call me on a Sunday, and that was Colonel Blackburn, my CO.

"Yes Colonel?" I asked as I answered the call. My face changed from one of indifference to one of dread as I listened to what he said.

"Yes Sir. I'll be there as soon as possible." I replied, and then hung up headed out the door to my car. It seemed that the moment that I dreaded the most had come to pass; I was being sent back out into combat, and this time I probably wasn't coming back.

0400 hours, July 4th, 2068

Somewhere above Northern Siberia

"Thirty minutes, Ladies." The pilot said over the intercom, snapping us all to full awareness. I looked around at the five other soldiers around me. These men were now under my command on this operation. Our objective was to capture the man, who was behind the Brazil crisis, Bjorn Ironside, a ruthless, cutthroat mercenary, alive. Apparently he and his other mercenaries, The Seawolves, were working on a portal to another world, and we had to stop them. Shouldn't be too hard, except for the alive part, because I really wanted to show him how much I enjoyed his work, but that would be for later, right now I had to focus on making the jump.

I again looked at the others and remembered their names. There was Staff Sergeant Jason Markosa, Kilo Two, a pararescueman from the Air Force Special Operations; he was the team's medic. There was Lieutenant Aston Bakara, Kilo Six, a U.S. Navy SEAL; he was the support specialist and computer guy. Lieutenant Mark Henderson, Kilo Five, another Navy SEAL; was one of the rifleman. Corporal Allen Greene, Kilo Three, a Marine Force Reconnaissance Man; another rifleman/demolition expert, and I never served with him before. And lastly was Sergeant Major Ellen Polaski, Kilo Four, a U.S. Army Delta Force Special Operative; and our expert on anything science, she was also a rifleman. This team was put together from the best of the Special Forces Branch of the U.S. Military, though I was not Special Forces at all.

"Alright you heard the man," I called out, "Asses and elbows." They all started moving, checking their gear, and getting their oxygen masks ready.

"Shit I can't wait to blow something up." Greene said, as he checked his bag full of C4 explosives. The others looked at him and shook their heads.

"This is going to be a covert op Corporal, you know that right?" Polaski said to him. The corporal was the youngest of us; he was only twenty-two years old.

"Ah come on Sarge, you can let me have a little bit of fun." Greene said back to her.

"Can the banter Marine." I said to him, "Alright all of you listen up." I added after he backed down. "This is going to be a difficult mission. I don't expect much from you, but…" I paused as I looked at them, "Do your jobs and don't try to be a hero and I guarantee that you'll get back to your families in one piece." They all looked at me, waiting. "I'll let you take these last few minutes to pray."

After that they all went silent and bowed their heads. When that happened I quickly took out my daughter's luck charm, kissed it and held to my chest. After that I took out my weapons and quickly checked to see they were still in top condition; then I slammed a magazine home and put a round in the chamber.

"Five minutes to drop, people." The pilot called out again. I nodded towards my team, and we all got up and lined up behind the closed ramp. I was first, Markosa second, Greene third, Polaski fourth, Henderson fifth, and Bakara was the last in line. Four minutes passed and the ramp opened up. It took thirty seconds for it to fully open. Thirty seconds after that the cargo bay went from being lit by red lights to being lit by green lights, and we all jumped.

Freefalling… the feeling you get when you fall through the air without restraint is incomparable to anything else in the world. It's a mixture of fear and adrenaline. Your blood rushes through your body as you drop through the freezing air, 31.4 kilometers above the earth's surface. This was the second time I have done a HALO jump. The first time was when I was deployed to China to fight the Communist party. All in all I was still scared as I fell through the air, though I didn't let it show, I never let my fear show when I was in combat.

I took a quick look at my HUD, in the upper left-hand corner of my visor, and noticed that my team was starting to drift apart from each other.

"Kilo Team, we're starting to drift apart, bring it in tight." I called out, using the team's call sign. The team drifted back into the formation that we had started out with just before we hit the clouds that were above Siberia, in a nasty blizzard.

Outside the clouds it seemed peaceful, inside of them, though, it was like a frozen hell in the sky. The crosswinds were blowing us all over the place. The water droplets were frozen solid and we were dropping through the pointy sides of the teardrops. Then there was the lightning. The first bolt of lightning nearly hit me and blew me to pieces; it came about a thirty meters from where I was falling. That was a little concerning, as I had always thought that I would die in combat, not from a strike of lightning.

A ringing went off in my helmet, which told me that I was now at four thousand feet. "Kilo Team, open your parachutes." I called out to the team and then I opened my own parachute and was jerked backwards, slowing my decent. Now with my parachute opened it was a lot harder to combat the wind. My team and I were being blown around all over the place for the next twenty or so minutes. But after that time I could see the ground coming up to meet me.

I hit the ground hard enough to cause my legs to buckle from the impact, and I rolled for a few feet. Immediately afterwards I quickly detached myself from my chute bag and popped the oxygen mask off of my face. The freezing wind caused me to pull up my scarf to cover my exposed skin.

A few seconds later the rest of the team landed next to me. One by one they landed in the order that they had jumped in. We quickly stuffed the parachutes into their bags and buried them in the snow.

"Kilo Team, Form up on me." I said as I pulled up my Bushmaster ACR assault rifle and flicked on its thermal scope and heartbeat sensor. Bakara pulled out his CheyTac Intervention sniper rifle and moved up along a ridge to our right. Everyone else pulled their customized versions of their HK416 assault rifles, and followed me down the ravine that was in front of us.

"According to the map, this ravine should run straight up to the mercenaries' camp, Captain." Polaski said to me as she jogged up next to me.

"Copy that Kilo Four. Let's move it out." I said, and then continued down the ravine. About twenty minutes later, we hit the mouth of the ravine, which was two hundred feet above the mercs' camp. The camp was composed of six metal buildings surrounding a much larger concrete complex. The complex was huge, big enough to fit a Nimitz Class Aircraft Carrier in it, it looked like.

"Kilo Six, do you have eyes on the complex?" I asked over the squad communications network.

"I see it Kilo Lead," Bakara said back to me, "Christ, its big enough to hold a whole damn army in it. There appears to be ten more underground levels to it as well as the four that are on the surface." He added.

"Copy that Kilo Six. Give me a sitrep on hostile activity on the ground." I said as I lay down in the snow, signaling for the others to do the same, and activated my camouflage.

"Six enemy patrols are on the perimeters of the camp, each patrol is made up of six men in each. There are three Russian T-55 tanks sitting at the only entrance to the complex as well, Kilo Lead." He replied. I nearly choked on my own spit when I heard that.

"T-55's! Really! I didn't know that they still made those." Greene exclaimed, beating me to the punch.

"Alright Kilo Team. You heard him, let's get cracking, pick your targets and await my signal." I said as I brought my scope to bear on one of the patrols. Near-silent movement signaled that my team was moving into positions where they could better see their targets.

"Kilo Three, I got my targets in sight." Greene whispered.

"Kilo Five, green here." Henderson said.

"Kilo Six locked one." Bakara said.

"Kilo Two, they're in my sights." Markosa whispered.

"Kilo Four, they are in for a nasty surprise." Polaski drawled.

"Copy that Kilo Team. Await my mark." I said as I practiced moving from target to target one more time; then sucked in my breath. "Mark." I called out as I pulled the trigger. The first merc went down without a sound. I quickly brought to bear on the second one and fired. He went down like a rock. Four more quick shots and the rest of the patrol were lying on the ground, dead.

"Kilo Lead here, my guys are wasted." I said as I prepared to rappel down the cliff. I got affirmatives from the rest of the team, letting me know that their targets were down.

"Kilo Six, what are those tanks doing?" I asked as I hit the ground and brought up my rifle.

"Kilo Lead, tanks are moving towards yours and Kilo Three's location right now." Bakara said to me.

"Copy that Kilo Six. Kilo Three, get loud." I said as I pulled out my M32-MGL out and crouched in the snow and angled the gun to bring 40mm of explosives down on those tanks.

"Roger that. Kilo Three going loud." Greene replied. A few seconds later I heard some muffled thumps and saw three grenades fly through the air towards the tanks. I fired as well. Within seconds the three tanks were burning husks of metal.

"Kilo Team, converge on the complex, double time." I called out. I got up and ran towards the complex. On my HUD I could see the rest of Kilo Team climbing down from their positions. Greene and I were the first ones to the complex. I took my position on the right side of the main door. Greene took his on the left. Polaski was the next one there. She took up a position right behind me. Markosa was after her and took his place behind Greene. Henderson and Bakara were in between our two groups and waited for us to lift the door.

I nodded at Greene and heaved upwards with my left hand. We held the door at waist height. Henderson and Bakara crawled through and kept watch on the other side of the door. Polaski and Markosa were next and they held the door for Greene and me. Once through, they closed it and we looked at the garage.

"It's empty." Markosa exclaimed when we saw that there were no crates or vehicles in the garage.

"Do you think that they started the party without us Captain?" Henderson asked me. I looked at him and shrugged my shoulders and gestured to the huge elevator at the back.

"Only one way to find out Kilo Five." I said as I began to move towards the elevator.

We took the elevator all the way to the bottom level. When we got down there I was surprised that there was no resistance.

"Eyes up Kilo Team. Watch for hostiles." I said. "Kilo Team let's split up. Kilos Four, Five, and Two, head down the left hallway. Kilos Three and Six, you're with me, we're taking the right." I commanded and headed down the hallway to my right.

After a few minutes of walking, Bakara signaled for us to halt.

"What is it Kilo Six?" I whispered to him.

"Contact up ahead, two doors down on the right. Only one though." He replied. "Should we knock?" he asked as he brought up his 50cal. SAW and trained it on the door in question.

"Maybe they can answer some questions." I said and signaled for Bakara to go ahead. We jogged up to the door, Greene on one side, me on the other, and Bakara in the middle to kick the door in.

I brought up my left hand and counted down from three with it. On one Bakara kicked the door in and Greene went in first, me second, and Bakara third. Inside there was a man wearing checkered coat and had a bowtie around his neck. He had been packing some baggage, but had stopped and looked up in fear when we burst in.

Greene swept left in the room and Bakara swept right, while I walked right up the man and slammed him up against the wall.

"Who are you and what are you doing here?" I asked him as I searched him for any weapons.

"M-my name is D-doctor Gustaven." He stuttered. "I was brought here by that mercenary Bjorn to work on a project of his." He added once he had recovered his wits.

"What project was that?" I asked him once I had backed away.

"To be able to conjure up an Eisen-Rosen bridge on a whim, and be able to open it up any place in the universe he wants." Doctor Gustaven answered nervously.

"Did you succeed?" I asked. Though the look in his eyes told me everything, I still waited for his reply.

"Yes and now he is leading his men through the portal. In fact they are probably in the last stage of their embarking." He said.

"Well that solves our mystery as to where everyone went." Bakara said, "Well what are your orders Captain?" he asked.

"Doctor you are going to lead us to where this portal is, and then Kilo Team and I will try to stop Bjorn." I said, and then grabbed the doctor and lead him out the door.

"Kilo Team, form up on my location. We got a madman to stop." I said as I walked out the door.

A half an hour later, we were sitting above the portal room, looking down at the mercenaries that were gathered down there. I was able to recognize Bjorn's face from my HUD. He had a strong jaw and cheekbones. His eyes were a light hazel, he had striking blue hair, and he had three long scars running down the right side of his face. He was standing in the middle of a group of six, really big and heavily armored soldiers. Not an inch of skin was showing on any of those six. Their armor seemed to be sealed as well and made out of a really strong metal.

Bjorn was directing the last of his personal army through the portal. They were carrying huge ammo crates through it.

"You'll have to strike now, if you want to stop him." Gustaven said from my elbow. I looked down at him and nodded. Then I pushed him up against a nearby ceiling support and tied him up with one of my ropes.

"You stay here doctor. We don't want you getting hurt." I said then backed away and gestured to my team to hook up their rappel lines to the railing on this floor.

"Kilo Six you stay up here and take out anyone who gets too dangerous, except for Bjorn." I said to Bakara then turned to the rest of Kilo Team. "Greene, you're up." I said, gesturing. He nodded and pulled out three flash bangs and pulled the pins.

"Fire in the hole!" he called out as he dropped them and covered his eyes. The rest of us covered our eyes as well. I heard three loud bangs and a lot of screams.

"Kilo Team, go loud." I said as I jumped over the railing and fell towards the floor, slowing my descent by gripping the rope tighter. As I fell I opened up with my ACR directing my fire towards the six metal soldiers by the portal. The rest of Kilo Team directed their fire at the other mercenaries that were recovering from the flash bangs. The metal soldiers closed their ranks but did not return fire. I was surprised when that happened and by the fact that they moved in the direction of the portal.

I took cover behind a crate when the mercenaries returned fire. I heard a muffled thump and an explosion right after that.

"Bullseye." Greene called out over the comms. I shook my head and popped up and picked off three mercenaries. I saw four more go down from Henderson's fire and six from Markosa. Polaski was concentrating her fire on a team of mercenaries that were trying to set up a machine gun. I kept up the pressure on the metal soldiers, forcing them to slow their pace to a slow crawl. Within a few minutes it was just us, the metal soldiers, and Bjorn.

"Kilo Team, concentrate fire on the tin cans." I said as I popped another magazine into my rifle. I saw Bjorn pop his head out from his guards just as they reached the portal. He looked right at me, smiled and waved.

"Cherrio Captain Daniels." He said as he jumped into the portal followed by his guards. The last one through stopped before it stepped through and turned back towards me. It brought up its rifle and fired two rounds right into my chest. I gasped as the rounds hit me; one of them actually punctured my chest. The metal soldier turned around after that and went through the portal.

"Shit the Captain's hit. Jas get over there and help him out." I heard Polaski call out. In a matter of seconds Markosa was standing over me, assessing my injury.

"Stop fussing and help an old man up." I said as I slapped his hands away from my chest. Markosa snorted in derision and hoisted me to my feet.

"What do you mean old captain? You're only forty-one." Henderson said as he walked over to me.

"Kilo Team, can the banter, we got a mercenary to catch." I said and gestured to the portal. They nodded and rushed towards it. We were about twenty feet from it when it suddenly shut off. A second later, there was a rifle report. I turned and saw a mercenary clutching his neck, next to a console that obviously controlled the portal. I followed the path of the bullet, as the mercenary fell, to see Bakara saluting me.

"Nice shot Kilo Six. Now bring that Doctor down here so I can ask him a few questions." I said in acknowledgement of his shot.

"Copy that Kilo Lead." Bakara said, then vanished from the railing, only to appear a minute later with the doctor strapped to his chest as he rappelled down from the railing.

"Doctor Gustaven, what happens when we reactivate this portal?" I asked once Bakara brought the doctor over to me.

"It is set to open up on the same world, though it will not open up in the same spot. It will open in a random spot. And you may get there some days after he does as these bridges do not follow the rules of time and space." He said. Then he pulled out a knife and stabbed me in the chest. "I'm sorry captain, but I can't have someone surviving my masterpiece in Brazil." He said right before Bakara blew his brains out.

I fell to the ground and clutched at the knife in my chest.

"Bakara go, activate the portal, Markosa help to my feet. The rest of you grab a couple of crates." I called out and reached out with a hand so Markosa could hoist me up. When he did I gasped in pain as the knife twisted in my chest, severing blood vessels.

The portal reactivated and Greene and Polaski disappeared through it. Henderson was next, then Bakara, and then me and Markosa.

As I stepped through it I felt a funny feeling in my head. I lost consciousness right after that.


End file.
